The keyboard might not be the greatest input device when you're writing in a foreign language that uses special characters. Now you can handwrite those characters in Gmail and Google Docs.

The new handwriting input lets you enter text by drawing with the mouse or trackpad (or, if you have a touchscreen PC, a stylus or your fingers). First you'll need to enable the new Input Tools by going to Settings and looking for the option in the General tab in Gmail or Google Drive. (Note: It looks like this update is still rolling out, so the option might not be there for you yet. Alternately, you could use Google's Input Tools Chrome extension as mentioned in the video above.)

Then you'll be able to choose the language you want to use. According to Google, handwriting input is supported for over 20 language, and in Gmail for over 50 languages, including Chinese, Japanese, Hindi, and Russian.